recommend me an all sky ip or usb/lens camera

[iwols]

hi,seen a lot of all sky camera images that were not of great quality so just wondered if anyone could recommend one that they use,thanks in advance 

Edited July 12, 2019 by iwols

[iwols]

now changed to usb as well

[DaveL59]

I think the USB ones would give you more flex with exposure times but worth checking what the specs are. The IP CCTV type tend to go no slower than 1/20-1/50s but with a fast lens they can still give an image, at least the starvis sensor ones at least. Question is what's the budget as that'll determine the options.

You also need to consider ancilliaries like:

• suitable housing that'll need to be water tight, regular dome CCTV types aren't meant to be mounted dome up like I've done. Gina here has made her own housing so a look at her thread would be worthwhile
• heat/cooling - painting the housing white will help a little
• cabling - USB has a length limit of 5M and you'll need some way to link the camera to your network, Raspberry Pi, PC etc. IP will need a network cable, you may be able to use PoE or as I've done a passive splitter setup with a regular 12V PSU at the switch end
• expectations - FoV and image clarity etc
• patience - tweaking the camera focus and settings to suit the conditions to get best compromise of viewing
• do you want to be able to remote focus or pan/tilt...
• curious critters/insects
• access for cleaning the dome, regularly

The fisheye lenses don't seem to go down to below F1.8 and prices rise the faster the lens. I've seen some nice 1.8mm F1.6/F1.8 lenses but they were in the £90-200 range. The ones I'm using were around £10-12 each so smaller front element and F1.8-F2 M12 or CS mount.

Astro cameras (USB) with a good lens will probably give the best image and show more stars but won't be a low cost setup. 

I went the cheap route as I had a couple spare IMX starvis CCTV modules. Wasn't expecting amazing star images but one day I hope to try stacking some video streams off it and see how it does. Meantime I do see bright stars, Jupiter and Saturn tracking across the SE of the image, aircraft blinking lights crossing overhead so am pretty pleased with the result overall 🙂 

Edited July 12, 2019 by DaveL59